A broken gleam on wave and flower —
A music that in utterance dies —
O Poets, and O Men! what more
Is all that Beauty which ye prize?
And ah! how oft Corruption works
Through that brief Beauty's force or wile!
How oft a gloom eternal lurks
Beneath an evanescent smile!
But thou, serene and smiling light
Of every grace redeemed from Sense,
In thee all harmonies unite
That charm a pure Intelligence.
Whatever teaches mind or heart
To God by loveliest types to mount,
Mary, is thine. Of each true Art
The parent art thou, and the fount.
Those pictures, fair as moon or star,
The ages dear to Faith brought forth,
Formed but the illumined calendar
Of her, that Church which knows thy worth.
Not less doth Nature teach through thee
That mystery hid in hues and lines:
Who loves thee not hath lost the key
To all her sanctuaries and shrines.